Oil spills at sea, in lakes, rivers, harbours, marinas or coastal areas are a serious environmental hazard. Wild life, marine life and coastal welfare, including commercial businesses, are at risk with each and every incident.
In responding to an oil spill, critical factors are speed of response and operational efficiency. These factors tend to favour the use of small skimmer-equipped vessels that can be rapidly transported to the area of an oil spill, can work multiple environments (lakes, rivers harbours and at least inshore), and with the use of the latest drum skimmer technology, are reasonably efficient in recovering oil. In contrast, large oil spill recovery vessels generally take longer to respond as they must make their own way by sea to the area of the oil spill, and are operationally limited to deep water. Larger vessels do, however, typically have the capability to sustain their oil recovery operations over longer periods not least because they have much larger storage tanks for recovered oil than can be installed on smaller vessels.
While the smaller types of oil spill recovery vessel are generally suitable for use inshore and in harbours and rivers, their range of operating environments frequently does not extend, on the one hand, to shallow inland waterways, and on the other hand, to offshore situations.
Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide an oil spill recovery vessel that has improved operational characteristics.